The Psychotic Experience
Psychosis produces a sort of bubble around you where your senses can become distorted and you have to find other ways of interpreting the world to make sense of these distortions. Voice hearing is the most well known form of hallucination but it can happen in other sensory modalities too. For me, usually when I’m stressed or distressed, I feel things. Psychiatrists call these sensations tactile hallucinations. I feel hands touching me and fingers prodding me. This is very disconcerting and when combined with the voices does make my view of the world scary and confused. I worry about my safety and lack of privacy. I get frustrated as I can seem to do little about it. These sensations and emotions combine together to mean that reinterpretation of the world is necessary. For me I sometimes wonder if I’m dead or decaying. I can sense an invisible presence around me, someone watching everything I do and say and who has access to everything I think and feel. I know I look alive but I feel so very little inside it’s possible my insides have rotted. Sometimes I am sure I have died inside and am putrefying. It also explains to me why I am surrounded by malevolent spirits. They are angry I pretend to be alive.
These feelings and sensations do not come alone. I have difficulty in dealing with other people. I don’t seem to show much emotion which, combined with voice hearing can lead to communication difficulties. I’m often withdrawn and apathetic and I can go for days with no real contact with other people. This feeds my fears – I wonder if I am lonely and ignored because I am dead. The minimal amount of contact I have with other people again feeds my doubts over my existence.
My illness (yes I admit there is something wrong) waxes and wanes. Sometimes I am sure of these things. At others I can see they are unlikely. I think the worst part was when I started to feel things start to go wrong. I knew my thoughts were unusual, my emotions seemed to have disappeared and my senses were beginning to trick me. I researched and I knew what that meant. I couldn’t bring myself to face up to that and that made things so much harder. It’s not easy to admit to yourself that your mind is breaking down.
Now I live half a life -I have a psychotic illness which means I’m half in this world, half in a fantasy one, my quality of life is such that I’m half alive and half dead. I hide away from admitting my illness and my history of illness due to shame and fear – the main reason I want to keep this blog as anonymous as possible.
Living with mental illness is not easy.
